Up to this point, none of the scenes in Arnold's class had ever shown Phoebe at any of the desks.
Grandma arrives at the spelling bee wearing a fur coat, but later, she is seen wearing a Greek warrior ensemble.
Arnold's spelling bee trophy is much bigger than any of the ones Olga has won that can be seen at the Patakis' house.
For the record, "Onomatopoeia" means "words that sound like the sounds they represent".
Cultural References[]
The story of this episode is similar to the plot of the first Peanuts movie, A Boy Named Charlie Brown.
Gerald tells Arnold to remember that “I before E except after C”. This is a reference to the 1970 Jackson 5 song ABC, which in turn refers to a well-known, though not infallible, mnemonic helper rule for English spelling.
Story Analysis[]
$500 wouldn't actually be enough to buy the keyboard due to sales tax, unless they live in Alaska, Oregon, Montana, Delaware or New Hampshire.
Apparently Helga is so good at spelling that Miss Slovak assumes she will win the contest over Arnold. Later, Arnold himself claims that "Helga's gonna cream" him, before Gerald motivates him. Big Bob is so confident that he goes so far as to offer free beepers if Helga doesn't end up winning the contest (though at the end loses such confidence as he tries to bribe Arnold into losing the contest). Helga eventually reaches the final round in the city-wide contest and forfeits it when discovers her father's foul play.
Morals[]
Cheaters don't win and winners don't cheat.
Good sportsmanship is much more important than winning.
